[Ditter]

I do move away, all the time. Then there are times like last night, when I am half way thru dinner (in the non smoking section) when a guy at the table next to me but across that invisable line that denotes the smoking section, desides to light up while perusing his menu. Then he has another after ordering & is still smoking when his food comes so he doesn't put it out while he eats, he lets it sit there & smolder. What do you do, get your food in a box & eat at home? My question, why can't that guy get HIS food in a box & smoke at home? He was the only smoker in the reataurant & he bothered at least 20 people. Thats why smokers are hated.

[newgeezer]

when a guy at the table next to me but across that invisable line that denotes the smoking section, desides to light up while perusing his menu.

Given your asthmatic condition and your sensitivity to cigarette smoke, one has to wonder why you would sit at a table so close to -- let alone next to -- the smoking section.

I know people who merely dislike cigarette smoke enough to ask for a table far away from the smoking section, and they don't even have a medical reason.

Oh, and although I'm not a smoker, I believe restauranteurs should have complete freedom to make the rules in their places of business. Let them appeal to the market as they wish, and let potential customers vote with their feet.

[Sloth]

Too many Freepers can't appreciate the difference between an inherently intrusive activity like smoking and a non-intrusive one like over-eating at a buffet.

[mysterio]

Oh, cry me a river. Go to a different resteraunt. Ask to be moved. Smoking is almost illegal already. If you are too slow to find a place where there's no smoke, then I have no sympathy for you.

[Just another Joe]

Thats why smokers are hated.

If you hate them all for the actions of one you are as bad as the Ku Klux Clan used to be.
Did you ask him politely to extinguish his smoke while he ate?
Or do you just complain about it here?
Realizing that he COULD have told you to shove it because he was in the smoking section, he might have realized that it bothered you and not smoked again while he was there.

[MEGoody]

Did you inform the guy that you have asthma and ask him to put his cigarette out? As a smoker, I would have gladly complied. But he had no way of knowing it was a problem for you, and he WAS in the smoking section.

[Hoosier Patriot]

He was the only smoker in the reataurant & he bothered at least 20 people. Thats why smokers are hated.

If I were seated within earshot of you in the restaurant, and you began wheezing and frothing with an asthma attack, I'm probably going to feel some sympathy for you, but I'm also not going to enjoy listening to you wheeze, and watch you treat yourself with your inhaler, while I'm trying to eat my dinner. Unlike you, however, I'm not in support of petitioning the government to have you banned from the restaurant. I'm not poking fun at asthmatics here, just drawing a parallel. Your asthma is your unfortunate problem that you must deal with. Saying that smokers should be made to pay for a problem that is yours sounds a bit too socialistic in my opinion.

[Hoosier Patriot]

By the way, no, I'm not a smoker. I quit the first of this year. By my choice, not because someone else forced me to because they didn't like what I was doing.